Hurricanes' Puppy Just Buries Linemen

MICHAEL MAYO COMMENTARY

"[Shaq] makes Bryant look like a puppy," Miami safety Ed Reed said after the Hurricanes met the Lakers and center Shaquille O'Neal at the Staples Center.

Still, he's a puppy who rolls over for nobody.

McKinnie, 6 feet 9 and 340 pounds, might have been momentarily dwarfed by the 7-1 O'Neal, but there's no doubt he brings the largest presence into tonight's national championship Rose Bowl.

He's an offensive lineman you actually notice, even when he's not messing up.

Which, of course, he never does.

Which is why he got 26 first-place Heisman votes and finished eighth in the balloting, something an offensive lineman never does.

Which brings us to another impossible scenario: a Nebraska defender beating McKinnie for a sack.

It's the biggest subplot of a bigger game, McKinnie trying to complete a perfect college career while his team looks to finish a perfect season.

Since making the switch to offensive tackle in junior college five years ago, he has never given up a sack. Ever. Not in a game, scrimmage or practice. Everybody guns for him, but nobody gets by him. If NASA could figure out a way to put him in orbit, he'd make a great missile defense shield.

McKinnie comes into this game with perhaps the most intimidating aura of any athlete since Greco-Roman wrestler Alexander Karelin of Russia. Karelin didn't lose for 13 years, until a Wyoming kid named Rulon Gardner shocked him in the gold-medal match at the 2000 Sydney Olympics.

McKinnie getting beaten for a sack tonight would be an upset of similar proportions, although he might be vulnerable because he had arthroscopic surgery on his left knee Dec. 3.

McKinnie insists he has healed sufficiently. He said he has been practicing at full speed. But with a top-5 NFL draft position hanging precariously by his repaired ligaments, he isn't taking any chances. He has a $3 million insurance policy through Lloyd's of London in case of calamitous injury.

"I was a little curious about [whether he might want to skip the game] myself," coach Larry Coker said. "Bryant never wavered. He initiated getting back into drills. We didn't force him into it."

McKinnie has too much pride to sit out his last college game, especially with a championship at stake. But anybody who saw UM running back Melvin Bratton tear up his knee and NFL future in the final minutes of the 1988 national championship Orange Bowl has to be crossing their fingers today.

"Not giving up a sack sometimes creates a life of its own, and that's not necessarily good for the team," Coker said. "But I like the fact that he protects Ken Dorsey's backside so well. It's an amazing streak. In his first NFL game, he'll probably give up six."

Coker was kidding. Hearing stuff like that tends to make McKinnie more motivated. Which is why it was more than a little baffling to hear a Nebraska backup defensive end named Bernard Thomas spout off the other day about how he'd get multiple sacks off him, if he had the chance.

Thomas doesn't even play on McKinnie's side.

Demoine Adams, the end who will line up opposite McKinnie at left tackle, is taking a wiser approach. Silence.

Around McKinnie, it's advisable to speak softly and carry a two-by-four. That might be the only way to get past him.

Earlier this season, Dwight Freeney of Syracuse made the mistake of getting on McKinnie's pregame radar screen. The NCAA sack leader woofed about getting to Dorsey two or three times. He spent most of the game horizontal on the Orange Bowl turf. Didn't have a tackle, never mind a sack. Syracuse lost 59-0.

"Everyone's trying to be the man, to be the first one to get a sack," McKinnie said. "I just try to stay focused."

The focus has rubbed off on the entire line. It has allowed only four sacks all season while Miami quarterbacks have thrown 340 times. And it has plowed holes big enough for Miami runners to average 5.2 yards per carry.

They are a tight-knit group that bonds by trading fierce insults at "rip sessions" the night before games. "We like to bust each other's chops," right tackle Joaquin Gonzalez said. "It keeps us loose."

About McKinnie, who played bass drum in his high school marching band before going out for football, Gonzalez said, "He's so fat. Just look at him. I remember the first time I went to McDonald's with him, he ate five Quarter-Pounders with cheese."